. >> suarez: you've gotanatopartnerin france fighting against a guerrilla army in mali. it's not an easy task, is it? >> not at all. from a logistical standpoint i thought the itn reporter was spot on when she talked about the logistical issues that are inherent in any kind of war, but they are particularly in hernt in one where the climate is difficult, where the terrain is almost impossible and where you're really not used to configureing your forces in a way that allows you to move rapidly in this kind of terrain. it's very much adown the american southwest and it is a very, very difficult area not only from the standpoint of things like temperature and mountains and things of that nature, it's the nature of the terrain that makes it very difficult to move from one point to another. >> suarez: we've been covering the fight in mali over the last several days but algeria hasn't been in the news for a long time. what's the state of play there? who's running the place? >> there's a government in algeria, it's one that probably we would describe as formerly a republic but an authoritarian